Abbigail Pomeroy
Abbigail Pomeroy has made art for as long as she can remember. Drawing, painting, sculpture, and writing were not occasional interests but necessary ways of processing experience. Raised between two very different homes, she found in art both encouragement and refuge, using it to work through emotions that were too large or difficult to speak aloud.
Her mother fostered that creative impulse while pursuing her own work as a performance artist, demonstrating the value of self-expression and staying true to oneself. Pomeroy pursued art classes whenever she could, from high school classes to pottery at the recreation center. She later completed a year-long certificate course at the College of New Caledonia and continued for a year at Vancouver Island University before deciding that the cost of further study did not match what she was learning.
Pomeroy’s practice is deliberately varied. She does not limit herself to a single medium, style, or subject, and usually keeps numerous projects in progress at once. This constant movement is partly practical, allowing her to move between ideas and materials, but it also reflects what she describes as a mind filled with competing trains of thought. Ideas are rarely scarce. The more difficult task is deciding which one deserves to be followed.
People are the most consistent subject in the work. Pomeroy began seriously drawing faces in eighth grade after an art teacher described them as the hardest thing to master. What began as a study of human proportions developed into a deeper interest in expression, particularly the ways emotion appears through the face and eyes. She once considered herself primarily a portrait artist, but her figures now carry a wider emotional and imaginative range.
The work also makes room for the macabre. Pomeroy has been drawn to dark and uncanny imagery since childhood, when The Nightmare Before Christmas became an early and lasting influence. Edvard Munch, Francisco de Goya, and David Lynch have further shaped her interest in atmosphere, unease, and psychological intensity. Rather than treating the dark as a fixed aesthetic, she allows it to coexist with the more intimate and expressive qualities of portraiture.
Pomeroy resists assigning a single message to her work. She prefers interpretation to remain open, allowing different viewers to find distinct meanings. Still, she recognizes that the self is always present, since every work is shaped by her own point of view. For her, artistic success depends on continuing to create with the intention of learning something new. Growth, experimentation, and community matter more than repeating a settled formula.
Looking ahead, Pomeroy hopes to keep making work in new ways alongside other artists. Collaboration and conversation are important to her practice, particularly the process of testing ideas with people who bring another perspective. Her advice to emerging artists is direct: keep going, practice consistently, learn by watching others, accept constructive criticism in good faith, and do not be afraid to make mistakes.
